Length of contributions LO12007

Richard Karash (rkarash@karash.com)
Thu, 16 Jan 1997 22:46:18 -0500 (EST)

Replying to LO11971 --

On Wed, 15 Jan 1997, Bill Harris wrote:

> I have a question (and it pertains to the talker issue and this one, too).
> Before I ask it, I must say I'm not intending it to be any form of attack.
>
> Is there something that those five are doing inadvertently which is
> inhibiting the others from picking up the slack? Perhaps the initiative
> those five are showing indicates that the others don't need to step up
> their contribution?

I can think of several dynamics that are probably involved (that is,
several structures) -- When there are a lot of messages on LO:

1. people who don't post much feel intimidated and don't write.

2. people read more selectively, and therefore:

- overall a lower percentage of messages get read, and
- maybe people tend to read known authors and ignore others

3. subscribers time is occupied reading and most people are even less
inclined than usual to write.

4. subscribers reading a smaller proportion of the LO msgs are less likely
to post for fear of repeating something that others have already said.

One more thing... I believe that many readers are quite uneasy about
unread messages in their in-box and feel urgency to get them out of there.
I also think many readers don't have the skills or the software to
organize msgs, put them in folders, and such (Ben talked about the value
of this). Skilled people with the right software can manage a huge volume
of msgs... I wonder if the more prolific posters here are the people who
have the skills and software to handle the volume? And, that the volume

Now, I'd like to make a gentle suggestion... that the most prolific
posters (please judge this for yourselves) reduce the # of msgs a bit.

I also hope that less frequent posters will feel free to speak up... I
hear ample evidence in this thread that people are interested in hearing
from you!

Finally -- and this is for everyone -- Please look at your message before
hitting the "Send" key... Ask youself, "Is this msg worth sending to 2000
people?"

As to the length of messages, I say (following a famous Einstein quote),
your message should be a short as possible to express your thought... and
not one bit shorter! Long posts are welcome here.

-- Rick

-- 
      Richard Karash ("Rick")    |  <http://world.std.com/~rkarash>
  Speaker, Facilitator, Trainer  |     email: rkarash@karash.com
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